[Flashback]
THOMAS WAYNE: [arriving home] Martha, where's Alfred?
MARTHA: [offscreen] I sent him to the market, I was going to make steaks tonight.
[8-year-old Bruce confronts his father as he comes up the Wayne mansion stairs.]
BRUCE: Daddy, daddy, look! I finished it. [Shows model ship.]
THOMAS: That's great, Bruce, I-[looks into his office]-What?!
[THOMAS's office has drawers open, with items & papers strewn all about.]
THOMAS: Goddammit, Bruce!
BRUCE: I, uh-I just needed some tape, daddy.
THOMAS: How many times I have I told you! Stay out of my office!
Clearly, talk isn't enough for you. But I'll tell you want I'm going to do!
[He grabs ship]
Maybe now you'll remember!
BRUCE: No!
[THOMAS throws the ship against the wall.]
[Still flashback. Bruce is glaring at his uneaten dinner]
MARTHA: [to THOMAS] This is the sixth night in a row.
This is ridiculous.
THOMAS: Bruce, go to your room.
[to MARTHA] I'll talk to him.
[THOMAS goes up to BRUCE's bedroom, where he's sitting on his bed, still glaring.]
THOMAS: Bruce, I know you think I'm horrible. I'm tough. My father was tough. And his father before him. That's part of being a Wayne. If we're not tough, our good fortune would soften and corrupt us.
[As he leaves BRUCE's room.]
But I'm fair. That's something you'll always get from me. The world out there isn't always fair. One day you'll learn that.
[Back to present day, BRUCE is still being held captive by GIARDINO and SCARFACE]
GIARDINO: So what a surprise. The Wayne mountain of money is just as rotten as every single other thing in this godforsaken town. Gotham's golden boy is gonna be its next mayor, and he's got a whale of surprise coming on his first day. And then he's going to be ours.
Gotham's not going to be saved by some white knight, it's gonna get saved by people like me.
[yelling]
You can't tell me the older way wasn't better! Before this anarchy, before the wars, before the countless lives! When men like Falcone and Keller had the strength to hold Gotham together! Why not go back to that?
BATMAN: Ask Fury.
GIARDINO: Oh, please.
Democracy only makes sense when you force it to.
You can talk about purity, clean government, true democracy all you want to. The choice in Gotham is what it's always been-chaos or order. And the people will always choose order.
That's what makes Wayne so perfect, cause he's selling 'em both-and he does it so well. They're flocking to him because he's what they want, the pleasant lie. That's what people really mean when they say they want to clean up Gotham. They want to fantasize about some dream world, and leave the reality to men like us.
Gotham's going to go back to the way it was always meant to be-a Swiss watch with a shiny coat of gold and me, inside, working the gears.
SCARFACE: I think he gets the picture.
GIARDINO: OK, I'm done. Do your thing.
BATMAN: Just one more question.
GIARDINO: By all means.
BATMAN: Why Scarface? Why one of the freaks?
GIARDINO: I adapt, it's what I do. If you can't beat 'em, join-
SCARFACE: Huh? I ain't one of the freaks. I'm a gangster.
GIARDINO: Right, of course, I meant-
SCARFACE: You think this is part of some Vegas show? You see me wearin' tights?
You think cause I'm made of wood, I'm one of them? I was fixin' points and crackin' legs since back you were in some fancy prep school. I ain't never geen to Arkham!
I've fought the clowns my whole life. I got scars to prove it. And you think I'm one'v em?!
GIARDINO: Oh God.
SCARFACE: The cornerstone of this racket is respect. Without it, jack squat. I must not have known who I was gettin' into gusiness with. But this is a mistake I can correct...right now.
GIARDINO: Batman, help!
SCARFACE: KILL 'IM!
[BATMAN breaks free from his constraints. SCARFACE's hoodlums line up to shoot GIARDINO, BATMAN uses a grappling hook to yank GIARDINO out of the way and saves his life.
[But then, the two men in Shreck's Palace masks show up with machine guns and blast the place. BATMAN manages to get away but GIARDINO is killed. SCARFACE gets away with one or two of his hoodlums, the rest are killed.]
[In the aftermath, BATMAN walks up to the wooden box and finds it empty.]
[BATMAN arrives back at the Batcave.]
ALFRED: Shreck called, he said he urgently needs to meet with you.
BATMAN: Oh, I bet he does.
[BRUCE shows up to SHRECK's office.]
BRUCE: Enough. Tell me what's going on.
SHRECK: Bruce, your blood is up. Sit down, please.
[BRUCE sits.]
SHRECK: I know your father got ripped from you early. But I never met mine, even once. I always wondered-
BRUCE: Cut the shit.
SHRECK: [produces a black-and-white photocopy of the Wayne photo we saw earlier.] I found something.
[BRUCE glances at it.]
SHRECK: You've seen it before. I figured as much.
BRUCE: We're going to bury this. Right?
SHRECK: No. I'm not.
I'm going to blast this photo everywhere I can. All over the Web. Papers, TV, every outlet I got. Everyone in Gotham will have this image burned into their memory.
[BRUCE tries to hand the photocopy back, SHRECK deflects.]
SHRECK: No keep that, it's yours.
I knew something like this would come up, if the campaign went long enough. The Waynes. So pure. So above-it-all.
I knew your family were hypocrites. And I knew the Cobblepots were crazy. I'm not a fixer or a kingmaker. I'm an excavator. Politics brings out the truth.
I fixed Firefly because I knew it would shake you out. Shake Gotham to the core.
BRUCE: You were behind Firefly?
SHRECK: I own the firetraps in Gotham! Fire inspections has been on my payroll since before I can even remember. It never traced back to me because I never made a cent. I just wanted to get to you.
BRUCE: You killed all of those people...just to stop me from becoming mayor?
SHRECK: Mayor? Hah! Mayors come and go. I am the light of this city, and I am its mean, twisted soul. It doesn't matter who's mayor.
I want to destroy you.
The Waynes. The Kanes. The Sionises. They all thought they were this city, but they were just the veneer. They weren't really from this city. They weren't of it. Only I can become Gotham. Our destinies are locked together in a death grip.
My mother was one of the City Secrets whores. She threw me out when I was 2. I grew up in that abomination they call an orphanage.
I was the sales clerk that bought the store. I bought the power plants. But I could never get a seat at the table. They could always smell that orphanage on me.
But now all of those elites are scrambling. The Owls are gone. The bosses are gone.
It's my time now. I am Gotham.
There was just one problem. You. Always you. The golden boy. Always in my way.
Your money will become toxic. Your friends will run for cover. That name, that magnificent name, will be tarnished. You'll finally be gone.
It's finally-
BRUCE: Hahahahaha
SHRECK: What!?
BRUCE: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
This is your grand master plan? Ruin my reputation?
Max. No one cares.
SHRECK: We'll see-
[In his pocket, BRUCE pushes a button on some little device.]
BRUCE: Fine, you win, I'm out. I already sent my withdrawal letter to the elections board.
But no one cares.
[BRUCE gets up, SHRECK stares.]
BRUCE: You just wasted a lot of people's time for no good reason.
And by the way, your gambling licenses are up for renewal. Might expect a fight on that.
[As he leaves, SHRECK pulls out the original photo from a file folder. Somehow, it's been all whited out.]
[BRUCE is back, wearing his bat-gear, in the Batcave.]
BATMAN: [speaking to someone on the phone] Believe it or not, it's good to hear from you. Thank you.
ALFRED: Was that Gordon?
BATMAN: McCaskill.
ALFRED: Can't imagine that was a pleasant conversation, Master Wayne.
BATMAN: That's Councilman Wayne.
ALFRED: [pauses] I see.
[BRUCE puts the THOMAS WAYNE photo on the screen.]
ALFRED: Is this the only copy?
BATMAN: We hacked into Shreck's system before the campaign began, it's not there. Believe it or not, he used an old-fashioned copier.
Our global facial recognition search turned up nothing. No photos with these particular people exist anywhere in the databases we have access to. Which is a bit more than Google.
As far as I know, this is the only image that exists of this meeting. Whatever it was.
ALFRED: There could still be more copies.
BATMAN: There could.
ALFRED: You ran for mayor so you could learn more about what's going on in this city. I'd say you've learned a lot.
BATMAN: But I'm not chasing ghosts down blind alleys in Gotham. It's all I'd ever do.
ALFRED: Yes, sir.
BATMAN: What do you want? For me to give the money away? That's what I've been trying to do.
ALFRED: Have you considered me? Your father's money has filled my belly for nearly my entire life. I might want to know.
BATMAN: Do you?
Or did you? Did you see anything?
ALFRED: [silence]
BATMAN: You're the one always telling me to let the past go.
That photo could mean anything. And in the end, it means nothing.
It doesn't change the man we both knew. And it doesn't change my mission. My dad taught me ideals, they're what matters. Even if they're just hopes.
Batman was never pure. Batman is Gotham. All of it.
ALFRED: Very well, sir. Is there anything else you need?
BATMAN: No, thank you Alfred.
[As BATMAN sits at his Batcave screen, we have an internal monologue for the first time in this story.]
My father-Thomas Wayne-was a good man. A fair man.
He taught me many things. But his most important lesson, the day he died
[BATMAN deletes the photo-the Batcave screen shows "FILE DELETED" across black. The light computer glow creates a dark silhouette around BATMAN's figure.]
He taught me this world only makes sense when you force it to.
The End.
